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Chicken Stew

A stew of chicken pieces simmered in water with salt, pepper, and thickening, served on toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,958 recipes. Both carry piperonal, which smells bitter, coconut. The science ↓

Chicken Stew

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the chicken

  1. Place the chicken pieces in a kettle and cover with water.

  2. Bring to a slow boil and cook for 30 minutes.

  3. Season with salt and pepper.

  4. Transfer the chicken to a cooker and cook for 6 hours.

  5. Remove the chicken from the cooker.

Finish the stew

  1. Add thickening to the stew.

  2. Bring the stew back to a boil and add dumplings.

  3. Return the stew to the cooker and cook for 30 minutes.

  4. Serve the stew on toast.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  2. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Chicken + flourtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,559 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

Chicken and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,559 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main protein and flavour, and releases body into the broth as it simmers.
Thickening (such as flour or cornstarch)
Starch swells when heated in the liquid, thickening the stew into a richer, cohesive sauce.

The step that matters

Add thickening to the stew. Starch must be heated in liquid to swell and thicken. Adding it to a stew that is not hot enough, or stirring it in unevenly, can leave lumps or a thin, cloudy texture.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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